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this Government in any considerable quantity is Jeyes Fluid, of which some 7,000 gallons are purchased every year locally at a saving which at first was approximately 7 d. per gallon compared with the price in England and after 1905, when the price was advanced to 3 s. a gallon was about 6 d. Sir E. E. Blake suggested in 1902 that the reason for the cheaper price at Hongkong was that the Jeyes Fluid procurable locally was diluted; but in view of the fact that the supplies of this disinfectant have since 1895 been made in the original casks which have been stored in a warehouse where tampering is believed to have been out of the question, that the casks have been issued as required direct from the warehouse to the Sanitary Department and that as far as is known only one quality is manufactured by the makers, this Government has been satisfied that it was obtaining as good Jeyes Fluid as could be procured in England. To place this point beyond doubt I am now directing that a cask be ordered through the Crown Agents the contents of which will be tested and compared with what is obtained locally.
In view of the cheaper price it was considered that the local purchase of an article of which